After finally getting adjusted to my new schedule, I’m happy to be back for a special edition of the weekly recap here on EDM Reviewer. Over the past few weeks, I’ve been disheartened by many releases and couldn’t bring myself to pick and write about nine of them. So as a result, I’ve picked nine that were released over the past three weeks to talk about them and what they represent for the industry.
VSNS – Five Days of Light
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Someone I’m surprised I’ve never covered is the talented Indian producer, VSNS. Melodies from “Wild Love,” “Across the River,” and “Dashavatar” have stuck with me for months and years at this point. Each one able to stand on their own merits without building on past discography. The VSNS sound is essentially a continuation of Maurice West’s initial big room sounds, utilizing similar leads and pitch bending. Seeing as Maurice West has moved on to different styles, it’s refreshing to hear that style with new and exciting melodies when VSNS releases something new.
For his latest track out on what seems to be his primary label home, Alphaz Records, VSNS continues his higher tempo big room track with yet another stunning and original melody. The utilization of acoustic sounds (with perhaps a heavy dose of KSHMR) mixed with a strong core melody drives the track through many dynamic shades with the second breakdown proving to be quite cinematic. Most producer who delve in this territory often stumble to strike the right tone, but VSNS nails it. “Five Days of Light” is yet another stellar addition to the increasing solid discography of VSNS. I hope to see him continue to grow to bigger labels and end up on Dharma someday soon.
89/100
Andrew Rayel x Chukiess & Whackboi – Kick, Bass & Trance
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It seems that Rave Culture has gotten into more of a swing, bring other Armada names into the fray and fan-favorites like SaberZ and Jaxx & Vega for a widely supported track. The common theme with the eleven releases so far is that they all have that anthemic quality. To varying degrees of effectiveness, all of them stand above the crowd as something you could see move an entire stadium to the music.
This trio has essentially built on the idea of “The Kick” and turned it into a psy-trance anthem albeit with less melody. Both drops are your standard psy fare with a repeating vocal that holds the track together. Even though it’s a common trick in the genre, having the first drop in 4/4 and the second in triplets did make me go a bit insane in a good way when I first heard it. When Mainstage Music first rebranded, I was expecting anthems that would go above and beyond what we had come to expect, but as the label progresses, it seems to be settling on just above average, solid, timeless tracks. And now that expectations are altered, I’m here for the ride.
82/100
KAAZE & Maddix – People Are Strange (feat. Nino Lucarelli) (Festival Mix)
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It’s been just over a month since EDM Reviewer took a hard look at KAAZE’s album, “Dreamchild” and summarized it as the “album the industry needed.” Now we’ve gotten the long-awaited festival mix of “People Are Strange” which was the catchiest new track from the album in my opinion. Now that we have the HQ version of the festival mix, it sounds to me like a Maddix VIP where he just took the melody and put it into his own sounds. The first drop sounds like the wet pluck from “Animals” and the second is just Maddix’s primary lead. It lacks the detail of KAAZE’s progressive sound and perfectly placed pitch bends. Truly this comes off like a FLP big room remake of the original.
61/100
Sub Zero Project – PSYchopath
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One of the most consistent and innovative producers in the hardstyle scene is back for their 13th single of the year plus a full-length album and the quality is still at a very high level.
Let me start off by saying I love the meta commentary vocal about psy being everywhere, truly a staple over the past few years. SZP has used it in other tracks and draws on a few of them when putting them together. But the whole package and arrangement makes this really empowering and enjoyable to listen to and be a part of. I enjoyed the moving bassline (almost trap-like) in the second breakdown which isn’t something you hear too often in hardstyle. I wish they had kept the triplets going a bit longer before jumping to the euphoric hardstyle drop. Only a slight misstep in an otherwise perfect arrangement.
86/100
Magnificence & 7 Skies – The Drill
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I just wanted to quickly cover the latest Magnificence collaboration with 7 Skies to talk about this unlikely team-up and enjoyable result. What we got out of this was some great video content from both of the artists talking about the release in near-documentary quality which was fun to watch. Then the song itself is on the short side but complete nonetheless. You get those signature Magnificence sounds in the drop paired with 7 Skies house melodies in the breakdowns. The drop is catchy enough to hum along to and remember. It’s suitable for clubs as well as playlists which makes it one of the ideal songs for a label to release these days. It’s undoubtedly a safe call but sometimes that’s what it takes to reach the most people with your music.
80/100
The Glitch Mob & 1788-L – Momentary Lapse
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Unfortunately I missed covering the first of this collaborative series from The Glitch Mob, a group that I considered my absolute favorite in the EDM scene, but I would have wrote that it was the beginning of the end. And now that we are on our third collaboration with no sign of improvement, I fear I was right. I’ve mentioned before that TGM is one of the only EDM groups that was able to follow and sustain a typical album release cycle with a few remixes and EPs thrown in for good measure. Now it seems they’re following MOTi’s business model with the label they’ve had for years, Glass Air. The names they’ve partnered with are certainly some of the more prominent ones in the bass scene right now, but the results are just lackluster. While initial singles from their last albums included the timeless, “Can’t Kill Us” and “How Could This Be Wrong,” these bi-weekly releases are all forgettable adaptations of their signature sound. I was wondering how the bass scene would change after TGM released their sample pack on Splice, but it honestly sounds like these producers took those samples, made a song, and TGM slapped their name on it. It seems they’re experiencing a “Momentary Lapse” in judgement.
56/100
Merzo – Crypto
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Three years after Merzo’s unfortunate comments and a few failed reboots, it seems he’s finally been set on the right path with his first proper single on a label since everything went down. “Crypto” seems to have taken heavy inspiration of the STMPD-wave, specifically Julian Jordan and Seth Hills. I’ve found Jordan’s new signature to be a bit muddy and Merzo has turned it into something really clean with his debut single. The structure has proper pacing with all the right elements on paper including two distinct breakdowns and two different drops. Now the question is, “Is this too derivative?” For my money, I say it’s different enough. He has an old-school second breakdown that is reminescnet of his prior career and the drops are both better than Julian Jordan’s with a cleaner bassline and one-shot. Time will tell if this is a one-hit from Loca Recordings or the beginnings of something bigger for the label and the new Merzo.
83/100
Sebastian Park – Like This
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One month into the existence of Generation Hex and we’ve finally gotten our first new face for the label. While Dastic & Robert Falcon are technically new to Hexagon, they’ve definitely got established branding and fans behind them. Sebastian Park has also been in the game for almost half a decade, but at least he’s a less familiar face that Hexagon could introduce to a wider audience. As for the track itself: it’s a somewhat worse iteration of the ever-growing brass bass house style. Some better examples of this style are a past Hex release, “Trump It” by Going Deeper & Cybermode and “Undercover” by David Flix. The use of triplets by Sebastian Park is sort of neat but halts the groove more than helps it. It’s a an alright track and a good sign that Hexagon is willing to reach further out for new faces on their label.
66/100
Leno – Jump To The Beat
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OG undergound festival music fans may remember the imprint from Joey Steel, OnPoint Network. Well it’s back and has some promising stuff on the page. This one is from a few months ago but it felt like a breath of fresh air to see an underground label pusher a fresher sound like the one in “Jump To The Beat” With a future house breakdown mixed with futuristic rap vocal samples paired with a chromatic and fun drop, you have a refreshing track from a relatively new face. Above all else, this track has power and confidence. Here’s to a strong future for Joey Steel, his imprint, and Leno.
77/100
This recap was provided by The QR Network which is a site for interviews with producers and DJs. Check out their interviews with Dannic, Chad Kowal, Salvo, Div Eadie, Valy Mo, and Olly James.
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